7 Serious Tuition Saving Tips

There was a time that getting a college degree was considered a necessity for a financially successful life, and while it may hold true that college graduates earn more than high school graduates, skyrocketing tuition, the accompanying student loan bubble and an anemic economy means that higher education can pose a financial risk. A big one.

“We’re at a point where student debt is crowding out other kinds of spending, making it impossible for people to buy a house or a car,” says Mitchell Wiess, a former banker who co-founded the Center for Personal Financial Responsibility at the University of Hartford. “It’s not sustainable.”

That’s especially true for middle-aged students. People who return to school after age 40 have fewer years of employment to help repay expensive school loans, and they also need to be setting money aside for retirement.

“How do you compete with a 25-year-old with the same master’s degree, and you’re middle-aged?” Weiss says.

One way to compete is to minimize your costs from the outset. Here is Weiss’s seven-step plan for students — middle-agers and younger — to reduce or eliminate their student loan debt.

1) Test Out of Tuition

Many people have heard of Advanced Placement tests, which smart high school students take to prove their mastery of math, English, history and other subjects. Less well-known are the College Level Examination Program tests, which are also used to show proficiency in various disciplines.

Perhaps the best thing about both AP and CLEP tests is that students who score well enough can submit their scores to their college or university. Many schools accept the tests in lieu of taking (and paying for) classes. At most schools, students can swap tests for up to 12 credits toward graduation, Weiss says.

That means you can save yourself a semester’s worth of tuition simply by taking a few tests.

But there’s a way to get the four-year degree without paying four years of astronomical tuition: Transfer in. Most elite colleges and universities accept up to two years’ worth of credits from less prestigious (and less expensive) schools. It’s the same route followed by one former student who spent two years at Columbus State Community College (tuition: $3,555), and transferred the credits to Harvard (tuition: $37,576), says Will Kopp, a spokesman for Columbus State.

“As an employer, I care more about where they end up than where they started,” says Weiss, who hired workers for the financial services companies he led until retiring four years ago.

3) Use Your Breaks

Most colleges and universities allow students to transfer credits from classes taken during winter and summer vacations. As long as you make sure beforehand that the classes are eligible, taking such intersession courses at a state university or community college is an inexpensive way to pick up credits.

“And you don’t have to knock yourself out,” Weiss says. “Just take a class at a time. That way you still get to have a vacation.”

4) Tweak Your Schedule

At most schools, 12 credits is considered a full course load. But what’s to stop you from taking 15, or even 18? Nothing but your own need for sleep. Loading up on classes may be intense, but it’s also a way to earn extra credits – and graduate faster – without paying additional tuition.

Here’s another way to think of it. If you don’t load up on credits, and stick with the normal 12 credits per semester, “You’re paying 50 percent more per credit than if you take 18,” Weiss says.

What happens when you’re feeling burned out from an 18-credit semester? Take 10 credits the next. Dropping just below your school’s definition of a full-time student also means you pay much less than full-time tuition. Weiss advises students to take this waxing-and-waning approach as a way to graduate faster, stay sane, and save money.

Many college administrators don’t like it when students play such tricks. Weiss’s advice: Fight back.

“The schools like the current system because they get paid,” Weiss says. “You have to advocate for yourself.”

5) Look for Small Money

Here’s the simple version of this tip: Apply for scholarships. In return for a few hours spent writing essays, you can win lots of money to help pay your tuition.

Here’s the advanced version: Apply for small scholarships. Many students apply for big ones, which offer tens of thousands of dollars a pop. But there’s far less competition for smaller ones, which may five only $250 to $500 each.

That means you have a much better chance of winning. Weiss knows a student who strung together a number of such small awards to cover almost $5,000 of his first year’s tuition.

“It was a pain in the ass,” Weiss says. “But he had a great strategy.”

6) Get a Job (The Right Job) First

People in the work force have a great advantage over people fresh out of high school: Their years of work experience can help them land jobs in which employers reimburse workers for going back to school.

This means that for people in middle age, the most important decision you make about college may have little to do with college itself. It may come years before, when you decide where to apply for work. Don’t consider just the up-front pay, Weiss advises. Employers who offer tuition reimbursement also tend to value their employees, and give workers the schedule flexibility they need to attend early night classes.

“You want to know that your employer has a stake in this,” Weiss says.

7) Apply Now

If you’re going to school in the hopes of landing a better job, don’t wait until you have your diploma in hand to start looking for that job. Apply now, making it clear that you’re still pursuing your degree. If you get a job offer, you’ll know you’re on the right track.

And if you’re roundly spurned by employers, you may discover that your degree isn’t taking you where you want to go (before you’re on the hook for several years’ more of tuition).

“Apply for the job first,” Weiss says. “You want to know you’re going to get a return on this investment you’re making.”

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Contributing writer for Credit.com, Chris graduated with honors from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, and has reported for a number of publications including The New York Times, TIME magazine and Popular Mechanics.

Please note that our comments are moderated, so it may take a little time before you see them on the page. Thanks for your patience.

Hi Chris – Most of your 7 Serious Tips are also noted in my book, “How to Save $50,000 on College”. Curiously I’ve had much better success with my other two books (“Graduate School on a Budget” and “Back to School for Grownups”). I hope students read and take note of your tips. These alone can save $50k or more in student loan debt. Thanks!
Laura Gilbert

Hi Chris,
I graduated from Penn State debt free and 1/2 year early. Reading your article was like following me step for step. The one advantage that I had was an educational inheritance from my Grandfather which was like an Educational Savings Account. It was about one year short of my tuition, but I was able to fill that gap with Student Work Study which put spending money in my pocket, but also cut my tuition substantially. One other strategy that you didn’t mention was “precise class scheduling.” Most colleges hold students longer than 4 years by scheduling widely need prerequisite classes scarcely and often out of the timing of most of their Majors. Otherwise, all of your points are precisely on tract. The trick is find lay out all classes on a timeline and get the schedule on these pivotal classes from the Registrar’s office. The advent of advanced Undergraduate programs that allow Juniors and Seniors to take 2 years of full college semesters in lieu of High School is a gift from heaven, because their High Schools have to pay that College Tuition. That program wasn’t available when I was in school. By the time I was working as a Department head for the Dean of Undergraduate Studies at The University of Maryland, I was astonished at how many hundreds of thousands of dollars Univ. of Md turned back unused every semester. I also discovered that the rarity of pivotal prerequisite courses was carefully planned, but never whispered out loud. There is one final point you made that 98% of undergraduates do not do; they rarely read job descriptions nor talk to employers before they graduate. Colleges claim that there is a direct relationship between their curriculum and the “real world;” but nothing is further from the truth. The ONLY source for this information are people that a student wants to be hired by when they graduate. Employers use computers that screen for tag words, particularly skills and courses. If those words are not in a resume’, a job offer rarely comes later. This is called “backward thinking,” we do it all the time. If you don’t know where you’re going, you won’t get there. College market departments are just as honest as most advertisers, ask them, they always tell students the truth,

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